licentious radio

Thursday, June 27, 2002
[11:28:09 PM]

Trifecta time. One version of the story [msnbc.com]. The first problem is that it's tastless to joke about "trifectas" that are based on two Trade Center towers and the Pentagon -- and 3,000 lives. It's monstrous, really.

But it gets better. The story itself appears to be a complete lie. Bush repeats the lie in order to blame deficit spending on something other than his tax cuts.

R. B. Ham [shaw.ca] points to this image that puts trifecta in perspective. Warning! It's a horribly sad picture. It's easier to be happy if you don't look.

[11:15:20 PM]
Lincoln Bedroom -- "Kenny Boy" Lay responded to questions about WorldCom: "Hiding expenses isn't a story. It even took them five quarters to hide barely $3 billion. We were stealing half a billion dollars a day, just from Californians. Hiding *that* kind of money is what counts. We also managed to pull a billion out for the executives, and more than three billion for our partners -- in just a couple of weeks before filing bankruptcy papers. So don't get me started on WorldCom. Where are the off-shore accounts? How many WorldCom execs got Bush appointments? Did you see WorldCom flooding Florida with money to prevent counting black votes? No! Don't get me started on WorldCom."

[8:30:42 PM]
BuzzFlash.com quips: "Bush Said He Would Run America Like a CEO. Little Did Americans Know He Meant Like a CEO of Enron or WorldCom."

[8:25:37 PM]
And while we're on the subject of Wall Street corruption, let's remember (big) Al Greenspan's responsibility for controlling margin rates. Al's the man to decide how much gasoline pours onto the fire.

He also decides in which election years to whack the economy. (Democrats in office: whack!) But that's a different story.

[11:45:35 AM]
Martha Stewart editorial cartoons:

Good Thing: tray fresh-baked cookies.
Not a Good Thing: hand in the cookie jar.

Martha Stewart's jail cell: "Roses and lady's breath turn this seatless toilet into a beautiful display." And the cellmate: "Why me?"

Even Doonesbury: "It was just between intimate friends over the holidays."

Poor Martha Stewart.

[11:41:17 AM]
Time to revisit this one:

REMAINING U.S. CEOs MAKE A BREAK FOR IT [satirewire.com]: El Paso, Texas -- Unwilling to wait for their eventual indictments, the 10,000 remaining CEOs of public U.S. companies made a break for it yesterday, heading for the Mexican border, plundering towns and villages along the way, and writing the entire rampage off as a marketing expense.

[11:37:40 AM]
NoMoreEnrons.com Flash Movie.

[10:44:22 AM]
Washington D. C. -- George W. Bush announced an immediate, high-level investigation into WorldCom. "They only donated a million dollars to the Republican Party last year," said Bush. "Anybody running a $3.6 billion fraud operation who gives us less than five percent is going down *hard*."

Just up the street, Senator Trent Lott promised to set the dim-witted W straight: "I promise WorldCom has never shorted me or the Republican Party." Millions of American voters expressed relief.